Citi is one of the world’s largest financial institutions, operating in all major established and emerging markets. Across these world markets, our employees conduct an ongoing multi-disciplinary conversation – accessing information, analyzing data, developing insights, and formulating advice. As our premier thought leadership product, Citi GPS is designed to help our readers navigate the global economy’s most demanding challenges and to anticipate future themes and trends in a fast-changing and interconnected world. Citi GPS accesses the best elements of our global conversation and harvests the thought leadership of a wide range of senior professionals across our firm. This is not a research report and does not constitute advice on investments or a solicitations to buy or sell any financial instruments. For more information on Citi GPS, please visit our website at www.citi.com/citigps.Citi GPS: Global Perspectives & Solutions March 2022METAVERSE AND MONEY Decrypting the FutureCiti GPS: Global Perspectives & Solutions March 2022 Ronit Ghos e, CFA Head of Banking, FinTech and Digital Assets, Future of Finance Citi Global Insights +44-20-7986-4028 | [email protected] Su rendran Project Manager ICG Digital Assets, Citi +44-20-7986-7766 | [email protected] Sophia Ba ntanidis Future of Finance Analyst Citi Global Insights +44-20-7500-9655 | [email protected] an Master Future of Finance Analyst Citi Global Insights +91-22-4277-5037 | kaiwan.hoshang. [email protected] Ronak S Shah Future of Finance Team Citi Global Insights +44-20-7986-3960 | ronak [email protected] Singhvi Head of Digital Assets ICG Digital Assets, Citi +1-212-723-3269 | [email protected] Expert Contributors Jamie Bur ke CEO and Founder Outlier Ventures Phil Chen Founding Partner, Race Capital Chief Decentralized Officer, HTC Stani Kulechov CEO and Founder The Aave Companies Urszul a McCormack Partner King & Wood Mallesons Sandeep Nailwal Co-Founder Polygon Yonatan Raz-Fridman Founder and CEO Supersocial Rebecca Rettig General Counsel The Aave Companies Yat Siu Co-Founder and Executive Chairman, Animoca Brands Founder and CEO, Outblaze Ioana Surpateanu Web3 and DeFi Investor, Advisor, and Entrepreneu r Huy Nguyen Trieu Co-Founder of Centre for Finance, Technology, and Entrepreneurship and CEO of The Disruptive Group With thanks to: Victor Alexiev, Karan Agrawal, William Artingstall, Joseph Ayoub, Matt hew Ball, Anas Bhurtan, Jonathan Bloohn, Victor Georges Marie Jan Du Mesnil Du Buisson, Ana Duek, Namrate Kanzaria, Richard Lomas, Omid Malekan, Niall McDermott, Alison McGaughey, Deepak Mehra, Rachael Montgomery, Garet h Robinson, Ashwin Shirvaikar, Ajit Tripathi, and Jelena Zec. March 2022 Citi GPS: Global Perspectives & Solutions © 2022 Citigroup 3 METAVERSE AND MONEY Decrypting the Future Have you ever had one of those “aha” lightbulb moments when you realize your grasp of technology, or lack thereof, showed your age? One of those moments hit me like a ton of bricks this week when I was asked to create my own avatar for a presentation in the Metaverse. I did manage to create something functional and presentable. What I did not do, or should I say could not do, was operate my avatar — make it walk or interact. Given the speed at which the Metaverse is advancing, I need to learn this quickl y because it was very obvious I was an un-savvy older person in the Metaverse room. The Metaverse as a concept has been around for a few decades. However, interest in the virtual world spiked at the end of 2021 following a rise in sales of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as well as announcements from Big Tech players indicating their interest and investment in the space. Today, the most popular way to experience the Metaverse is via a video game played on a virtual reality (VR) headset. But in the report that follows, we discuss the possibili